Places and times seen in Munakata city

In Munakata it is a traveling bird, and it can be seen rarely in the spring and autumn migration period (April to May, September to October). Can be observed on islands and coasts, but can only be seen rarely.

Characteristic

Total length 22 cm. They are almost same color in both sexes. The face and the chest become a characteristic black and white pattern.
The male and summer wings have a white head, black longitudinal spots, and the upper surface shows brown, black, white spot patterns. The beak is black and short and slightly warped.
Females have lower redness on the upper side than males, heads are brown, and feet are orange.
In summer, the top is dark brown and reddish.

Habit

As a traveling bird, living in coastal sand beaches, rocky places, tidal flats, estuaries, rivers, paddy fields. There are many behaviors in a few birds or small groups, actively walking around the waterside and rocky areas, turning over pebbles, wood chips, recollections and the like, predators crustaceans, insects and the like from rock gaps. Such behavior became the origin of the English name Turn Stone (which turns the stone upside down).

distribution

A few traveling birds winter over in Japan. Worldwide, it breeds along the Arctic coast, overwintering in the Baltic Sea / North Sea coast, the Africa continental coast, the Arabian coast, the Indian Ocean coast, the Australian coast, the Indonesian coastal island coast, and the South China Sea coast.

Other

Because the pattern is beautiful and flashy, it is said to be a Kyoto woman, and it was said to be "Kyoto women 鷸" of the kanji name.